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In today’s coal fired power plants, it is important to keep coal dust and coal spillage in the load zone area to a minimum. Many plants struggle to keep these areas clean, due to not having enough time or man power to properly adjust skirt rubber or fix holes in the chutes. Around many load zone areas you will usually find coal piles in between troughing idlers and on the floor. This coal spillage is expensive to remove and if not properly fixed the coal piles will reoccur again and again.

This midwest coal fired power plant had this problem. The skirt rubber wasn’t getting adjusted or changed when needed; piles of coal all around the load zone area floor caused a safety hazard. The existing load zone was missing hoods, dust curtains and was rusting in some areas. All these problems together were causing coal to spill and coal dust to fill the air around the conveyor.

Objective: Provide the latest conveyor technology and engineering to solve a coal dust and spillage environmental concerns and increase productivity.

Challenge:
In today’s coal fired power plants, it is important to keep coal dust and coal spillage in the load zone area to a minimum. Many plants struggle to keep these areas clean, due to not having enough time or man power to properly adjust skirt rubber or fix holes in the chutes. Around many load zone areas you will usually find coal piles in between troughing idlers and on the floor. This coal spillage is expensive to remove and if not properly fixed the coal piles will reoccur again and again.

This midwest coal fired power plant had this problem. The skirt rubber wasn’t getting adjusted or changed when needed; piles of coal all around the load zone area floor caused a safety hazard. The existing load zone was missing hoods, dust curtains and was rusting in some areas. All these problems together were causing coal to spill and coal dust to fill the air around the conveyor.

Solution:
For these reasons ASGCO® has developed the first advanced containment system for dust control solutions in the coal industry. ASGCO®’S Pro-ZoneTM system is a patent pending modular conveyor belt load zone system that optimizes the seal for air/coal dust tightness on the receiving conveyor belt. This fully self-contained system is comprised of our Slide-N-Roll bed that supports the belt; this eliminates the gaps you would have in a typical load zone with standard troughing idlers. The Slide-N-RollTM has easy “slide out” design for easy removal of the UHMW support bars. The new center roll design is easy to change out, just remove the retainer clips and pop the center roller out.

Side guards attach to the Slide-N-RollTM frame to create a side enclosure that allows the angled hoods to be easily mounted. Hoods can be made out of aluminum or steel which completely encloses the entire system, inspection doors can be added to the hoods for quick inspection. Inside the Pro-ZoneTM are dust curtains and an internal splash sealing rubber system to contain the coal dust.

Results:
The ASGCO® Pro-ZoneTM has been in service for about 8 months and has helped eliminate coal dust and spillage in the customers load zone area. The customer is very happy with the performance of the ASGCO® Pro-ZoneTM system and it has lowered his cleanup costs for that area.